


Behind the Walls

by Qille



Series: The Vengeance Series [11]
Category: The Yogscast
Genre: Blood, Body Horror, F/M, Flux Buddies, Gen, Gore, Poison, Swearing, Violence, body parts, many many innuendos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-28
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-05-03 17:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5301116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qille/pseuds/Qille
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During the events of Outbreak, Lalnable Hector escaped YogLabs. Now he's up to no good, and it's up to Xephos, Honeydew, Lalna, and Nano to stop him before time runs out. It's a race against the clock and themselves as they struggle to stop Lalnable and whatever evil plan he's come up with.</p><p>I actually wrote this before Lalnable started showing up in the Flux Buddies videos and also before Lalna was fluxed, so all the similarities you see are purely coincidental. How cool is that?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In the Shadow of the Mountain

Escaping had been the easy part. There was so much chaos after the outbreak that nobody noticed him walking out. Those two fools were so busy trying to rebuild their precious labs. He had simply walked out the front door... after a quick pit stop by the weapons and development division. He had everything he needed to progress with the plan he had been preparing since the minute he stepped out of the cloning vat.

He opened the door and stepped out into the sunlight, flinching at how bright it was. It was his first time ever seeing the sun. 

He took a deep breath, and the wind blew across the field. The air was so different out here. It even tasted different. Not stale like the stagnant air of the glass cube that had held him since he first came into existence. 

Glancing over his shoulder one last time, he stepped out of the shadow of the mountain and into the light for the first time in his life.

An evil lopsided grin crept across his scarred face. In one smooth movement, he strapped the jetpack he had picked up onto his back. He had everything he needed.

He would make them pay. Xephos, Honeydew, the Other one... he was going to make them all pay.

He took off, flying easily as if he had done it a thousand times. He aimed the jetpack north and disappeared into the clouds.

**XXX**

Several hours later, Xephos stood up and stretched his aching back. He had spent all day trying to repair the floor. Honeydew had wandered off after half an hour – Xephos found him fast asleep in his secret room. He let him sleep though, because he figured he would get more work done by himself.

It was dark by the time he had finished. He started walking the halls, inspecting for more damage and replacing the lights to keep the monsters away.

Then he turned down the dark hallway near the clone storage. He felt his heart stop when he saw that this had been reached by the bacteria as well.

Barely able to breathe, he sprinted down the dark hallway, throwing down torches and jumping over the gaps in the floor. He burst through the door at the end of the hallway and breathed a sigh of relief. The bacteria hadn't reached the master clones.

Shaking from the scare, he turned and went back down the hallway, repairing the floor as he went.

Then he noticed the blinking red lights from beyond the glass.

Xephos froze, and his breathing again caught in his throat.

He turned and looked through the half-corroded glass into the barely lit room below.

The glass prison that once held _him_ was missing two walls and the ceiling. They had been corroded by the bacteria. And he was gone.

His heartbeat ringing loud in his ears, he sprinted out of the hall and out into the lobby. He ran out the front door and looked around, panicked. 

The night beyond the shadow of the mountain was empty. He was nowhere to be seen.

After taking a quick hit from his inhaler, he ran back inside and pulled up the security footage. Almost every camera in the building had been damaged during the outbreak. That must have been when he escaped.

His hands shaking, Xephos pulled up the footage for the cameras aimed at the front door of the Labs.

There he was. Ten minutes after the outbreak. He had walked right out the front door. He looked directly at the camera and smiled before putting on a jetpack and flying off.

Xephos checked the footage time again. That was what confused him. From his cage, it took two minutes to get to the front door. So what had he been doing in those extra eight minutes?

A few seconds later, he realized what had happened. He had stopped somewhere and taken something. But what had he taken? There was no way to find out when half of the supplies had been dissolved.

Shaking his head, Xephos turned and ran into Honeydew's office. He threw aside the painting that hid the door, and he ran inside and flipped Honeydew out of his bed.

“Ah! What the fuck Xephos!” exclaimed Honeydew, jumping to his feet and blindly swinging his fists for a second.

“He escaped...” stammered Xephos, breathing hard.

This got Honeydew's attention. “What are you talking about? Who escaped?”

Xephos gulped. “Lalnable Hector. He got out.”


	2. The Twist

The search for Lalnable was a frantic one, but Xephos wanted it to be kept quiet. He didn't want a panic to spread like wildfire.

Honeydew, on the other hand, thought a widespread panic would be appropriate. He figured everybody would want to know if there was a homicidal cannibal running around, hiding only Notch knows where. But Xephos was adamant about keeping it a secret. Honeydew couldn't figure out why.

The surveillance camera had caught him heading directly north, so that's where they went. They stopped at every village they found, asking if anybody had mysteriously gone missing, or been attacked by something that could have been an animal. But none of the villagers ever reported anything strange, or any missing people.

That was when Xephos realized that if anybody had been killed by Lalnable, it would have only been a day previously, and nobody would have realized the person was missing.

“He's smart,” Xephos said to Honeydew as they left the seventh village they had come across. “He wouldn't attack anybody inside the village.”

“What do you mean?” asked Honeydew.

“He would have attacked the hunters that leave the safety of the village. The ones that are normally gone for days. Nobody would suspect a thing until it was too late.”

Then, almost as if on cue, something fell right in front of them. It was a bloody hunting dagger that looked like it had a bit of skin clinging to it.

Slowly, they looked up.

Hanging from a low tree branch only a few meters above their heads was the body of one of the village hunters. Or... what was left of the body. It had been brutally dismembered. There was dried blood covering the branch it was hanging on, and a few leftover bits of intestines were hanging over the sides. It's eyeballs were also missing, and so were it's teeth and the skin of it's face.

There was a note on the corpse. It had been driven through it's hand with what looked like a shattered bit of bone, and the message on it was written in dried blood.

Xephos carefully took the note and looked at it.

_Catch me if you can, love._

It was signed with a small heart, drawn from the blood.

On the back, Xephos also found the remains of the hunter's heart, smeared across the page like finger paint.

Honeydew turned and vomited in a bush.

Xephos gulped, trying to keep his composure. “Uh... i-it looks like t-this is only a... a day old...” he stammered, quickly pulling Honeydew to his feet and ushering them down the path, away from the remains of the body. “He can't have gotten far.”

Honeydew only groaned. “I think I want to be a vegetarian...” 

“I know how you feel...” muttered Xephos.

They kept moving north.

**XXX**

Lalna was sitting on the floor, with Barnabas on his lap. He was fixing a wheel that the little robot had managed to knock loose. Luggage was sitting next to him, occasionally chewing on his lab coat.

It took a bit longer than it should have, because Barnabas kept fidgeting, but Lalna managed to get the wheel back in place. He set Barnabas on the ground, and the little robot zoomed around in a circle, testing out his newly fixed wheel.

“There we go,” said Lalna, standing up and stretching his back. “All fixed, right?”

The little robot chirped happily at him.

Suddenly, the door opened and Nano walked in, folding up her hang glider. Luggage jumped to his feet and quickly scuttled over to her, happy to see her even though she had only been gone for five minutes.

She quickly greeted Luggage before turning to Lalna. “Hey, I just saw Xephos and Honeydew when I was flying back here,” she said.

Lalna's eyes widened a bit. “Oh, really?” he asked, a bit of apprehension appearing in his voice. “Where were they?”

“They were down by that village near the river,” said Nano, putting away her stuff. “Should we go see what they were up to?”

Lalna shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant. “I guess,” he said. “Or we could just leave them to it. Knowing them something's probably going to explode.”

“Now I'm _really_ curious,” said Nano, looking out the window.

Lalna gulped. “Well uh... I guess we could watch them from the security cameras I put up.”

Nano glanced at him. “Security camera?”

Lalna shrugged. “The other night I got bored after you fell asleep, so I built some cameras to pass the time. Wasn't sure where to put them all, so some of them ended up in the village.”

“Why the village?” asked Nano.

“It was either that or the shower,” said Lalna with a guilty smile.

Nano groaned loudly and threw a sapling at him.

Lalna laughed as Barnabas and Luggage fought over the dropped sapling. He shook his head a bit and turned, going out the door. “This way,” he said.

He led Nano around to the back of the house, where he opened a small trap door in the ground. It led to a small set of stairs, which descended into a room with several monitors.

“Next time remind me to leave you with a coloring book or something,” said Nano. “Or a broom. Maybe then you'd clean up after yourself.”

Lalna ignored her sarcasm and sat down at the chair in front of the monitors. He quickly typed a few commands into the keyboard, and several images appeared on the screens.

They both gasped at what they saw.

Dismembered bodies lay strewn about. There was blood everywhere, and some of the buildings were on fire.

Xephos and Honeydew were nowhere to be seen.

Neither of them spoke. They simply stood and ran out of the room.

**XXX**

When Xephos and Honeydew had entered the village, it was calm and peaceful. This immediately had Xephos on edge. Especially because they were so close to the ruins of the Jaffa Factory. 

He was also on edge because they hadn't seen any other signs of Lalnable Hector since the previous day, when they found the remains of his dinner. 

They had found the mayor of the village, and he had brought them inside to talk to them about the strange news he had been receiving from other villages nearby. He told them that other villages were reporting animal attacks. Or at least they assumed it was an animal because of how savagely the bodies had been torn apart. 

That was when the explosion happened.

Xephos and Honeydew had run outside, shocked to see several buildings on fire.

They came around the corner and found the culprit.

Lalnable Hector stood in the center of the village. He was wearing his goggles, and he had a mask over his mouth and nose. 

He was holding a Molotov cocktail. 

Xephos quickly grabbed Honeydew and pulled him behind a building as Lalnable threw the flaming bottle. It exploded in a flash of flames, which lit the building they were hiding behind on fire. They quickly stumbled away from the flames and ran back towards the town center.

Lalnable had gone, but he had left a distinct trail of bloody footprints.

“Don't let him get away!” exclaimed Xephos, sprinting after him too fast for Honeydew to keep up.

Xephos rounded the corner and came face to face with Lalnable, who had been waiting for him.

The second Xephos was directly in front of him, he pulled the trigger on the gun he was holding.

There was a sharp _crack_ and Xephos stumbled backwards, crying out in pain and clutching his shoulder. Lalnable was so close to him he could hear him chuckle. He blew him a kiss and then he was gone.

Honeydew finally caught up a second later.

“Xeph! What happened!” he exclaimed, seeing Xephos slumped against the wall, struggling to stay upright.

“Nothing,” growled Xephos, probing the wound. He could feel something hard lodged into his skin, so he grabbed it and ripped it out, splattering a bit of blood.

He had been shot with a dart.

“Couldn't even find real bullets...” muttered Xephos, dropping the dart and forcing himself upright, the pain less severe now that the dart wasn't lodged into his shoulder.

Honeydew shook his head. “Which way did he go?”

“This way,” said Xephos, breaking into a staggering run, following the bloody footprints.

They led out of the village and into a more forested area. That was when the tracks disappeared, the blood having run out.

Xephos had his sword out, and Honeydew had his axe at the ready. The sounds of buildings burning and villagers screaming echoed through the air. Right at that moment, the storm clouds that had been lingering on the edge of the skies all morning moved in and eclipsed the sun. The wind started to blow, rustling the leaves.

Xephos and Honeydew stood back to back, slowly turning and scanning the trees for any signs of the maniac.

Suddenly, they heard footsteps. A figure in a lab coat appeared from behind one of the trees.

Xephos lunged forward and slammed him against the tree, holding the sword to his throat. The figure let out a sharp cry of surprise.

Xephos would have slit his throat had he not realized that the scientist had green eyes instead of teal. That he had on a short sleeve lab coat instead of a long sleeve one. That he had a long white scar running across his left eye. That his right hand was mechanical.

He started to pull his sword away from Lalna's throat, but a split second later, Nano came out of nowhere and slammed into his ribs, knocking him backwards and nearly throwing him to the ground. She stood between him and a shocked Lalna, holding her sword out dangerously.

“What the hell is wrong with you?!” she exclaimed, glaring at Xephos, her purple eye glowing dangerously.

“Look, I'm sorry, it was a mistake,” said Xephos, holding a hand up. “But you guys shouldn't be out here. It's dangerous.”

“Yeah? Why?” asked Lalna, stepping forward and standing next to Nano.

“Yeah Xephos. Why is it so dangerous out here?”

Everybody jumped and looked around, trying to see where the voice had come from.

“Uh... that wasn't me...” said Lalna.

Suddenly, there was another sharp _crack_ that echoed around the trees. Xephos flinched, expecting somebody to cry out in pain, but nobody did. However, he did finally find Lalnable.

The clone was sitting in a tree on a branch about fifteen feet off the ground. He was smiling, his face and hands covered in blood. He still had his goggles covering his eyes, but he had removed his mask. In one hand he was holding the dripping remains of a heart. He had something else in the other hand, but Xephos couldn't tell what it was. The gun was sitting next to him on the branch, a bit of smoke coming out of the end.

Lalna and Nano's reactions were a bit different. They both jumped like they had been bitten by something. Nano looked more than shocked, and Lalna looked like he was going to have a heart attack. Xephos imagined he was flashing back to what had happened the last time he had been cloned.

“Well now that we're all in one place,” said Lalnable, “I'd like to congratulate you on finding me. So good job. What are you going to do now?”

“Well I'm planning on stabbing you in the throat,” said Xephos casually, glaring up at him.

Lalnable smiled. He ignored Xephos and looked over at Lalna and Nano. “Well don't you two look like you've seen a ghost.”

Lalna couldn't speak. He quickly glanced back and forth between Lalnable and Xephos.

Lalnable laughed when he saw this. “Aw, I'm guessing Xephos never told you, did he?”

“Don't listen to him,” growled Xephos.

An inquisitive look came over Lalnable's face. “Feeling angry, darling?”

Xephos snarled at him.

Lalnable turned back to his other. “So Xeph says that you shouldn't trust me or listen to me, right? Well he's the one that cloned you without you knowing. And because he used a stolen bit of DNA instead of the whole thing, I came out with a bit of a flaw...”

“Wonder what that could be...” muttered Nano.

Lalnable took a bite of the organ he was holding. Lalna looked a lot paler.

“So anyways,” said Lalnable casually, “the reason he cloned you is because of that whole incident with your arm. He was going to scrap me and use me for parts... Y'know, it's funny that all you needed to do to get back to the Nether was to come to this new world. I bet if they had figured it out, you probably could have kept your arm.”

Suddenly Nano stepped forward, her hands flashing purple and glowing fluxy magic swirling around her hands and arms.

“Alright you bastard, give me one reason I shouldn't shoot you out of that tree,” she practically shouted.

“Oh, I struck a nerve, didn't I?” asked Lalnable with painfully fake sympathy. He smiled at how traumatized Lalna looked after being forcefully reminded of the painful memory. He was certain he was having flashbacks.

Nano snarled and stepped in front of Lalna, her hands glowing even brighter.

“I wouldn't do that if I were you,” said Lalnable.

Nano hesitated a bit. “Why not...?” she asked suspiciously.

Lalnable held up his other hand, revealing the object he had been holding.

“What the fuck is that?” asked Honeydew.

“Ask her,” said Lalnable, looking at Nano.

Nano gulped and lowered her hands, the glowing flux disappearing and her hands returning to her normal flesh color.

Lalnable's smile grew more sadistic. “There ya go.”

“Whose is that?” asked Nano nervously.

“Well let's see,” said Lalnable, tossing the remains of the organ away. He reached into his pocket and pulled out what looked like a shattered piece of bone. Xephos remembered he had used something similar to pin the note to the dead body. But Nano recognized it for what it was.

It was a bone needle.

He stuck the needle into the voodoo doll he was holding.

Nano flinched a bit, looking around to see if anybody cried out, but nobody did. Whoever that voodoo doll was taglocked to wasn't here.

“As you can see,” said Lalnable, “the person this little trinket it linked to isn't nearby at the moment. If he were, you would hear him _scream_.”

As soon as he said “scream,” he squeezed the doll tightly in his hand. Nano imagined that the person linked to the doll just had a few ribs broken.

“Oh that's fun,” said Lalnable, looking at the doll. “I think I actually felt the bones crack.”

“Okay, that's enough,” said Lalna suddenly, startling everybody.

“Did your flashback end?” asked Lalnable. Then he noticed that the plasma canon on Lalna's mechanical hand was activated. “Okay, let me guess. You were going to shoot me in the chest, and when I fell, Nano was going to catch the voodoo doll so that the owner of it doesn't get his spine broken?”

Lalna hesitated for a moment before nodding. 

“Yep,” he said. Then he raised his hand and shot a plasma ball at Lalnable.

The clone lunged to the side and the plasma ball smashed into his shoulder. He grabbed the tree trunk and kept himself from falling, but he did drop the doll. Nano lunged forward and snatched the doll out of the air, cradling it and keeping it from hitting the ground. She quickly jumped back to her feet and ran back over to Lalna.

“Well look at that, it appears that your plans actually do work sometimes,” growled Lalnable.

“If it had gone to plan you would be dead,” said Lalna, watching as Nano safely stored the doll away. 

“Then it's a good thing it didn't go completely to plan,” said Lalnable, clutching his bleeding shoulder. “Otherwise you and Xephos wouldn't have a chance.”

Nobody spoke. Lalna glanced nervously at Xephos.

“Oh, you didn't figure it out yet?” asked Lalnable, his psychotic grin returning. 

“Oh shit, what did he do now?” muttered Honeydew.

“Well if you haven't figured it out yet, I guess I should probably tell you,” said Lalnable with a shrug. “You've both been poisoned.”

“What?!” exclaimed Lalna and Xephos.

Right then Nano, who was standing slightly behind Lalna, noticed something.

“Um, Lalna... hold still for a second.” Then she reached up and pulled a dart out of Lalna's back.

“When did that get there...?” muttered Lalna, looking at the dart.

Xephos, on the other hand, suddenly looked very pale. He clutched the wound on his shoulder, where Lalnable had shot him only minutes earlier.

“What is it?” stammered Xephos. “What did you poison us with?”

“Well, I used a poison that Lalna created a few years ago when he worked for Israphel,” said Lalnable. “Of course, he doesn't remember that because they tried to kill him, but he poisoned himself and put himself into a coma and lost his memory when he woke up. Unfortunately for you guys, I don't have that block on my mind, so I can easily remember how to make all those poisons and weapons of mass destruction. But hey, you never know. With the poison I used, you might be forcefully reminded of what you did before the Old World,” he said to Lalna.

The poor scientist looked like he was in pain.

“But don't worry,” said Lalnable. “I also remembered how to make the cure, so you don't even have to worry about making one yourselves. However, I used two slightly different variations of the poison with both of you, so you'll both need different cures.” He pulled two pieces of paper out of his pocket and crumbled them up a bit.

“Here's the coordinates to your cure, Xeph,” said Lalnable, tossing the paper down to Xephos and Honeydew. “And here's the coordinates to yours.” He tossed the other one down to Lalna and Nano.

“If you don't find the cure by sunset tonight, you'll most likely die,” he continued. “You should both start feeling the effects of the poison soon, so I suggest you hurry while you can still move. If you need me, I'll be elsewhere taking over the world.” He stood up on the tree branch.

“Now before I leave, I'd like to mention that you need two people to get to the cure, so don't go alone. But if by some miracle you end up making it to your cures on time, feel free to come try and stop me,” he said nonchalantly. “Because just after sunset, I'll be putting on a little... fireworks display. Nano, you'll really enjoy it. Now, if there aren't any more questions, I'll be leaving and letting you guys get started on your little game.”

Lalnable looked down and pushed his sleeve back, revealing what looked like a watch strapped to his wrist. Lalna and Xephos recognized it as a teleporter. However, just before he pressed the button that would teleport him away, he stopped and looked back up at them.

“Oh yeah, Honeydew, you may need this later.” He tossed a small bag down to Honeydew, who caught it and looked in.

Inside the bag was a face mask, handcuffs, and a straightjacket. All similar to the ones Lalnable had been forced to wear during his time at YogLabs. 

He looked up again and Lalnable was gone.

The second he was gone, Lalna whipped around and faced Xephos.

“What the hell were you thinking?!” he exclaimed.

“What are you talking about?” asked Xephos angrily.

“You cloned me? Why the fuck would you think that was a good idea?! None of my clones _ever_ come out right! You saw what happened in the Nether! Those damn clones are part of the reason I lost my fucking arm!”

“The only reason he exists is _because_ you lost your arm!” Xephos shouted back at him. “I knew you were having nightmares every night and I knew you were struggling to adapt, so I tried to fix it. I tried to help but it went wrong! We had to keep him in a fucking cage! We had to put a mask on him so he wouldn't eat his own fingers!”

“If he was so dangerous then why didn't you just kill him?” asked Lalna, his voice becoming gravely quiet.

Xephos looked a bit pale. “That... that doesn't matter...”

“You were experimenting on him, weren't you?” asked Lalna accusingly.

“It was... just blood samples... To see what went wrong and how we could fix it...”

Lalna rolled his eyes. “Blood samples, right. Is he an Enderbeast too? Because that's literally the last thing we need.”

“No, he's not, but...” Xephos stopped, seeming to realize something. “... But I'm more interested in this story about you working for Israphel,” he said, glaring at Lalna.

“Oh I would gladly tell you all about it,” said Lalna, his voice venomous. “I'd love to tell you how I singlehandedly helped him destroy everything and kill everybody that you met, because I'm sure I had a part in it. The only problem is I can't remember anything that happened before the Old World. Literally, nothing. So if you want to know more about how _evil_ I was then go to the fucking Void and ask Israphel yourself.”

“Well I can easily see you being a villain,” growled Xephos. “Runs in the family, doesn't it?” 

Lalna turned to punch Xephos in the face – and his metal fist would have made a nice impact – but Nano grabbed his arm and stopped him. Honeydew grabbed Xephos and pulled him away just before he could lunge at Lalna.

“Both of you!” shouted Nano. “Calm the fuck down! This is probably part of the poison. It's messing with your minds. I looked at the coordinates and they're both really far away. If any of us want to make it by sunset, we need to get moving _now_.”

“But what about Lalnable?” asked Honeydew. “We don't even know where he's hiding or what he's planning.”

Nano shook her head. “I don't know. We'll figure it out later. But for now, we need to move.” She turned to Lalna, who had calmed down significantly in the past few seconds. “Okay?”

He nodded.

Nano turned to Xephos, who was still fuming and glaring at Lalna, like he personally blamed him for the scar across his throat and the nightmares he still occasionally suffered from.

She looked at Honeydew. “You two better get going.”

Honeydew nodded, looking a bit scared about how angry Xephos had gotten. He quickly pulled his taller friend back and led him away, looking at the paper with the coordinates.

Nano sighed and looked back at Lalna, whose face was now blank. She recognized it as the same face he had whenever somebody mentioned a touchy subject that could trigger a flashback. Or the face he had whenever he thought back to losing his arm. He had told her he wasn't very sentimental about his limbs, but she knew he was lying.

“Come on,” she said, taking his left hand – the organic one – and leading him out of the trees and towards the coordinates of his cure.


	3. Nerves

Nano and Lalna walked in silence, their heads low and their shoulders hunched against the strong wind that had picked up. 

Lalna hadn't spoken since they set off, and Nano couldn't blame him. After what Lalnable had said, he was probably having an unpleasant time to say the least.

Nano was also keeping a close eye on him to see how the poison was affecting him. They still didn't know what exactly it did, but she had her suspicions. She noticed how he would occasionally shoot a nervous glance over his shoulder or look around, flinching a bit as if expecting something to be there. She noticed he had also started nervously scratching at his left arm. However, she had noticed him doing that _before_ he got poisoned, so that could be his nervousness showing through. It was also possible he was looking over his shoulder for Lalnable or Xephos, since both of them seemed like enemies at the moment. 

The whole situation was so confusing it made her nauseous. 

“Lalna, how do you feel?” she asked after another minute. 

He didn't respond for a moment. Then he shook his head a bit as if snapping himself out of a trance.

“What?” he asked, looking at her.

Nano narrowed her eyes a bit. “Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah, I'm fine...” he muttered bitterly. 

Suddenly, he jumped and whipped around. He could have sworn he heard something moving behind them. 

“What! What?” exclaimed Nano, looking around too, shocked at his sudden movement.

Lalna looked around a bit more before slowly turning back to Nano. “S-sorry...” he muttered. “Thought I heard something... Guess I'm just a bit on edge.”

He started scratching at his arm again. 

Nano shook her head a bit and took his hand. “C'mon, we should keep moving.” Even beneath his glove, she could feel him trembling a bit.

She had suspected the poison was messing with his mind, but she hadn't been sure how. Now she was realized what was most likely happening.

The poison was making him paranoid. It was making him afraid. 

**XXX**

Xephos was fuming. He was beyond pissed that all of this was happening. Lalnable was an experiment, a mistake. He knew he should have killed him when he had the chance. He was pissed at himself for not killing him, he was pissed at Lalnable for putting them through this ridiculous game while he worked uninterrupted trying to destroy the world. He was even pissed at Lalna for having such flawed and mutated DNA that he couldn't even be unwillingly cloned properly. 

While Xephos was deep in thought about how angry he was about everything happening, Honeydew was quietly observing him. 

He realized that Xephos had been angry since Lalnable shot him, and it hadn't stopped. He had been getting progressively more and more livid, and it didn't seem to be stopping.

It was in that moment that Honeydew realized what the poison did. And a split second later, he realized what the handcuffs and straightjacket and mask Lalnable had given him were for. 

And he realized that if he didn't find the cure for the poison soon, Xephos might turn on him. And if Xephos turned on him, he knew that one of them would end up dead.

**XXX**

Lalnable stared at the glowing screen of the large computer in front of him. He smiled, watching as his plan fell into place. Xephos and Honeydew had taken the bait, and so had Lalna and Nano. Judging by the blinking red light next to Xephos' name on the screen, the poison was spreading much faster in him.

As for the final member of the party, he was nowhere to be found. Of course Lalnable had lost the poppet to that angry flux monster, but he didn't know that. He was probably trying to find the poppet right then. 

“This is so useful,” muttered Lalnable, glancing up and down at the computer screen. “Next time I see Lalna I should thank him for building it for me...”

Chuckling to himself, he glanced at his watch and saw that the next step of the process was ready to begin. 

“Oh, it's going to be a good show,” he said with a small laugh, absently biting his bottom lip until he tasted a splash of salty blood. He still wasn't quite hungry after his massacre at the village an hour ago, but he knew by sunset, his dinner would come to him.

And all he had to do was wait.


	4. Fear

The fear was getting worse. Lalna couldn't go ten seconds without looking over his shoulder. Several different times, he thought he saw something lurking behind the trees in the distance or poking out from a hole in the ground, but those illusions vanished as soon as he tried to focus on them.

It didn't take long for the sense of overwhelming fear and impending doom to start creeping up on him. The stormy weather didn't help the mood either. 

He felt his heart racing, and after a bit longer, his vision started to blur as his mind was overrun with panic. He scratched at his arm so much that it hurt, but that itch along with the pain was a good anchor. 

That, and Nano.

They were nowhere near their destination, and Nano knew that the only way they could make it there in time was if they flew or teleported. However, it was too stormy to fly, and every time Lalna teleported he risked waking the Enderbeast, something he swore never to do again. They had to walk, but they weren't moving fast enough, what with Lalna stumbling and looking over his shoulder.

The poison was making him afraid. And it was when he suddenly jumped and turned around several times that he started hyperventilating and Nano had to do something to calm him down before it turned into a full scale panic attack.

Taking him by the shoulders, she sat him down on the ground and knelt down in front of him, holding his face so he had could only look at her.

“Lalna, you need to stay calm,” she said, doing her best to appear relaxed, even though she was so worried about him she felt like she was going to vomit.

Lalna closed his eyes and shook his head a bit, his breathing shaky. 

“I can't!” he exclaimed. “I keep seeing things and hearing movement and screams and voices...” He started violently scratching his arm, his eyes darting back and forth.

Nano sat back and grabbed his hands, which were trembling. He was so scared. She realized that his heart and mind wouldn't be able to take much more of it, and if he wasn't cured soon, his heart would stop. He was literally going to die of fear if he wasn't cured. 

Shaking her head a bit, she let go of his hands and reached up, taking off her sapphire necklace.

“You remember when you gave this to me, right?” she asked, looking up at him. He nodded. “You didn't think much of it at first, but you saw how much I loved it, so you stole it from me in the middle of the night after I fell asleep.”

Lalna smiled a bit. “I didn't exactly steal it...” he muttered. “It fell out of your pocket when you took your clothes off, and I nearly tripped on it later that night.”

“Right,” said Nano, rolling her eyes. “Well, remember how I was panicking when I couldn't find it? But you surprised me by turning it into a necklace and putting it on me when I wasn't paying attention?”

Lalna nodded, and Nano could clearly see that he had calmed down significantly.

“Well, whenever I'm scared, I just hold onto this, and it reminds me of you,” she said. “You keep me brave, Lalna...”

Then she put the necklace on him. “I hope I can keep you calm...”

Lalna looked down at the sapphire and carefully took ahold of it. Nano could clearly see the tension leave his shoulders, and a bit of color returned to his pale face.

“Feel a bit better now?” she asked.

“Yeah...” he said quietly, smiling at her.

She nodded. “Good, now we've gotta go.” She stood up with a groan and pulled Lalna to his feet.

“You okay?” he asked, noticing her grimace.

Nano looked down at her feet. “Uh... I wore the wrong shoes for an adventure... Why don't you tell me exactly how you would build a new set of freerunners?” 

Lalna smiled, knowing exactly what she was doing. He took her hand and they set off again, Lalna babbling on about all the different parts and components of the shock-absorbing boots.

Nano smiled, knowing that as long as she kept asking him questions with long, drawn-out answers, he would be distracted, and they would be okay.

**XXX**

Xephos wasn't doing as well. 

While the poison was making Lalna afraid, it was making him angry. Several times now, he had to stop and calm down, not only because he got so angry his heart started racing at a dangerous pace, but because his rage began to interfere with his breathing. At one point he considered having Honeydew blindfold him to keep him from seeing anything that would set him off, but the thought of being in the dark sent a shard of icy fear through his heart. 

His fear of the dark had relapsed dangerously to the point where he flinched if he closed his eyes for too long.

They had only been walking for several minutes when Xephos needed to sit down again. This was beyond frustrating for Honeydew, who knew that they had to keep moving. However, he couldn't say anything to Xephos, because it would set him off again.

However, when Xephos didn't get back up, Honeydew started to get worried.

“Xeph? What's wrong?” he asked cautiously.

Xephos sat there staring at the ground. He was quiet, and he looked calm for the first time that day.

“Honeydew...” he said quietly, his voice barely a whisper, “... do you still have those restraints Lalnable gave you...?”

Slowly, Honeydew nodded.

Xephos let out a shaky sigh. “I can't... I can't keep myself under control anymore... I think you should use those now... just... just to be safe...”

He didn't argue. He simply pulled out the straightjacket and put it on Xephos, securing his arms tight to his sides. Then Xephos bent over, and Honeydew put the mask on him. He realized that what he thought were handcuffs were actually meant to go on Xephos' ankles to prevent him from running, but Honeydew didn't put those on, because they still needed to move if they wanted to reach the coordinates by sunset.

Neither of them were happy about this new arrangement, but they had no choice. Xephos was becoming too dangerous, and it was only a matter of time before he hurt Honeydew or himself.

**XXX**

Lalna was able to keep his fear under control for the longest time. However, the second the poison intensified, it all came rushing back, overwhelming him so suddenly that he collapsed on his hands and knees, frantically looking around and hyperventilating.

His vision had gone, and he couldn't see Nano anymore. All he could see were glimpses of what he realized were flashbacks. He saw the Nether and the torture chambers and the End and the castle and YogLabs and the Farlands and every human or creature or anything in between that had tried to hurt him. He saw all those lonely years he had spent talking to himself and causing chaos, and he saw every world he had destroyed.

However, his heart nearly stopped when he saw beyond the Old World. Before he had woken up with no memory.

He was starting to remember.

Violently shaking his head, he covered his ears and screamed. But no matter what he did he couldn't stop himself from seeing dark labs and testing chambers and explosives... seeing his hands covered in blood, seeing a girl he once knew and loved, holding her cold bloodless corpse in his arms...

He didn't want to remember.

He was muttering, trying to look away.

Then finally, _finally_ , he heard Nano's voice. He focused on nothing but her voice, and all the memories disappeared. His vision returned and he saw her kneeling in front of him, her face pale and tense.

She was here. She was real. She wasn't going to die because of him.

The sense of relief he felt was quickly destroyed by the poison. The fear was so intense he felt sick. He could feel his heart racing and he couldn't catch his breath.

He felt his nose start to bleed, and a second later, his world went dark and he collapsed.

Nano caught him when he collapsed, and she held him tight, cradling him and gently stroking his hair out of his face. She was so worried she felt even sicker than before.

It took about ten minutes for Lalna to come back around. At that point, Nano was beyond worried sick and to the point where she would have thrown up if he had been unconscious for another minute.

“W-what happened?” asked Lalna quietly, blinking and trying to bring Nano into focus.

“You had a bit of an episode, but you're okay now...” she replied, lying through her teeth.

He seemed to realize it too. “You're lying,” he stammered quietly. “We both know I'm not okay...” He started scratching at his arm again.

Nano sighed and glanced down at his arm. “What's wrong with your arm? Why have you been scratching at it for a week?”

Before Lalna had a chance to answer, Nano reached forward and pulled his glove off, but she gasped and dropped the glove when she saw what it had been hiding.

Lalna's entire hand and most of his lower arm was covered in flux.

“Oh shit...” muttered Nano.

Lalna even jumped when he saw the flux. “Oh, that explains it...” 

Then Nano noticed something. “Lalna, sit up.”

He did as she said, and she moved behind him and lifted up his lab coat and shirt. She felt the color drain from her face. His entire back was covered in veins of purple flux.

“How... how did this happen?” she muttered. She leaned over Lalna's shoulder to look him in the eye, and when she looked close enough, she saw that his eyes had a slight tinge of purple around the center. She moved around so she was sitting in front of him again, and she pulled down the collar of his shirt. Sure enough, the flux on his back had spread across his left shoulder and up the left side of his neck.

Nano shook her head a bit. “That... that wasn't even there a few nights ago...” she muttered. “None of it...”

“I think you would have noticed if it was,” said Lalna, absently staring at his infected hand.

“This... this doesn't even make any sense!” exclaimed Nano. “I'm not contagious unless I want to be, and it's only been a week since we were near your castle... So if you were only exposed a week ago, then why is it spreading so fast?”

“I think I can explain,” said a voice from behind her.

Nano whipped around to see Ridge standing there, his hands behind his back.

She stood up, ready to start screaming at him and demanding to know where he's been and why he's been letting a madman like Lalnable run around, but she stopped when she got a proper look at him.

Ridge looked pale and tired. His eyes were glassy, his lips were a bit blue, and it looked like he was having trouble breathing. Nano could see that his jacket had come undone a bit, and she could see the heavily bloodstained shirt underneath.

“What happened to you...?” she asked quietly.

Ridge shook his head a bit. “I'll get to that later,” he said, sounding breathless. He stepped past Nano and walked over to Lalna. He knelt down in front of the scientist.

“What have we got here?” he muttered, getting a good look at Lalna, who appeared to be spaced out.

“He's been poisoned,” said Nano. “I think it's some kind of fear inducing hallucinogenic.” 

“Good thing, too,” said Ridge, placing his hand on Lalna's chest. “Poisons that mess with the mind are surprisingly easy to draw out.” A second later, Ridge's hand began to glow gold, and he pulled it away from Lalna's chest, drawing away streams of black liquid.

As soon as all of it was gone, Ridge closed his fist and the poison was destroyed. Lalna instantly slumped over, relieved beyond belief that all the fear had gone.

“Now this,” said Ridge, gesturing to the flux spreading up Lalna's arm, “this is interesting...”

“Why is it spreading so fast?” asked Nano, walking over and pulling Lalna to his feet.

“Because he's a good host,” said Ridge with a shrug. “It's simple when you think about it. Flux is the essence of chaos and entropy, so that's the kind of environment it thrives in. Nano, it took so long to even show up on you because you're a terrible host. You've got a stable mind and strong will, but this maniac here... You're unstable, you're a danger to yourself and others, and... Wow, listen to me, I sound like Honeydew...”

Nano and Lalna glanced at each other.

Ridge shook his head. “You're a good host because you're crazy, and you have so many demons in your mind fighting for dominance. That's why you're drawn to your castle. You're drawn to the flux like a moth to fire. And the only thing that's keeping the flux from poisoning you is the same thing that's been saving Nano this whole time.”

“And that would be... what, exactly?” asked Nano.

“Your blood,” said Ridge. “You're a demigod, you're too powerful to be poisoned by something as trivial as flux.”

“And what about me?” asked Lalna nervously. “What's going to keep me alive?”

At this point, Ridge started looking guilty. He glanced down at his feet and scratched the back of his neck.

“I uh... I guess it's confession time, then...” he muttered, looking suddenly more uncomfortable than he had before. “The thing is... it's kind of my fault you don't remember anything before the Old World...”

Lalna narrowed his eyes. “What did you do...?”

Ridge glanced around. “I uh... I found you... You were unconscious, and barely breathing... I thought you were dead already, but I checked, and you were still alive... I knew you wouldn't survive on your own though, so I gave you a bit of blood to bring you back... but when I was trying to heal you, I kinda tapped into your memories to see who you were, and there were so many bad things there... I thought this would be a good opportunity for you to start fresh...”

Lalna shook his head a bit. “Look... I'm not mad that you put a block on my mind. I got a glimpse, and I'm glad I can't remember. But you said you used your blood to heal me, right?”

Ridge nodded. “It wasn't enough to Change you like what happened with Xephos, but it may have caused some other... side effects...”

Lalna glared at him. “You mean side effects like Livid?”

Ridge slowly nodded.

Lalna looked like he wanted to strangle him. “So it's _your_ fault that I had to deal with Livid for so long? It's your fault that I went entire weeks without sleeping because I was afraid of him? That I nearly killed myself twenty times because I was trying to get rid of him? That was all because of you?”

“Look, I never meant for that to happen!” exclaimed Ridge. “I was trying to save you!”

“And by trying to save me you nearly killed me,” snapped Lalna.

“Okay, that's enough,” said Nano, stepping between them. “Ridge, it looks like you're bleeding again.”

Ridge ran his hand through his hair and pulled it away bloody. “Yeah, it appears I am...”

“How did that happen anyways?” asked Nano. “And is it the same reason you weren't here hours ago?”

“Yeah...” muttered Ridge. “The thing is... the cannibal clone has a voodoo doll of me, and I've been trying to find him and get the doll back. But he's using some kind of magic to block me from seeing him...”

Nano's eyes widened, and she reached into her inventory, pulling out the very doll she had captured from Lalnable that morning.

“This wouldn't happen to be yours, would it?” she asked, handing him the doll.

Ridge looked like he was going to cry from relief. For what Lalna assumed was one of the first times in his life, Ridge thanked her. Then he carefully unwound the doll and let the remains fall to the ground.

Almost instantly, he stood up straight again, and all of his visible wounds began to quickly heal.

“That doll was preventing me from healing,” he said, glaring at the remains. “Now I'm just wondering how Lalnable got my blood.”

Nano only shrugged, but the word blood triggered something in Lalna's mind. 

“Oh shit...” he muttered, looking back and forth between Nano and Ridge, who he reminded himself to be mad at later when their lives weren't in danger. “Ridge, you said you used a lot of blood to save Xephos, and it Changed him, right?”

Ridge nodded.

“Xeph was poisoned by a variant of the poison I had,” he said frantically. “Xeph's poison most likely makes him angry. If he gets too angry, could he possibly do something incredibly dangerous?”

Ridge's eyes slowly widened as the gravity of the situation came crashing down on him.

“Oh fuck... He could accidentally trigger God Mode,” muttered Ridge. “He could destroy himself and anyone around him...”

“We know where they're heading,” said Nano, handing him the piece of paper with the second set of coordinates written down.

Ridge got impossibly paler. “Shit, they're heading right for Strife's base... I've gotta find them before they get into even more trouble.”

“What about Lalnable?” asked Lalna. “He said he had something planned for sunset, and that's only a few hours away...”

“I might know where he is, so once I've taken care of Xephos and cured him of the poison, I'll head there and try and stop that crazy bastard from carrying out his plan. You two just need to stay out of the way and out of trouble. And when I say that, I mean it. I'm begging you to stay out of this. The last thing we need are more dead bodies...”

Then he turned, jumped in the air, and sped off towards Honeydew and Xephos.

Nano and Lalna looked at each other before shrugging dejectedly and starting the long walk back home.

They walked in silence for half an hour, with Lalna constantly glancing at his fluxed hand.

And then he stopped.

“What is it?” asked Nano, turning to face him. “What's wrong?”

Lalna's mouth split into a slightly deranged grin. “I think I know where Lalnable is...”


	5. The Battle of Gods

Xephos had been struggling with his restraints since they were put on. He was shaking with rage and constantly fighting, and Honeydew had to struggle to keep him walking. However, he knew they still weren't moving fast enough.

By the time the storm above them began to intensify, Xephos was wild with rage. He was shaking and thrashing and screaming, his eyes deranged and bloodshot. Honeydew couldn't get too close to him, so he had to put a collar and chain around Xephos' neck and drag him along. It was like trying to keep a wild animal under control.

Honeydew couldn't help but be reminded of a bedrock zombie when he looked at his best friend. 

They were getting closer to the coordinates and the cure when it all went wrong.

Xephos suddenly dropped to his knees. He started shaking so hard Honeydew thought he was convulsing. Then suddenly, there was a blinding flash of light. Honeydew stumbled backwards, shielding his eyes. A moment later, the light was gone, and he dared a peek. 

The straightjacket had disintegrated, the mask was shredded, and the collar and chain had melted, the molten hot metal dripping to the ground and singeing his clothes, but not his skin. 

Honeydew didn't move for a moment. Then, cautiously, he spoke.

“Xeph...?” he squeaked out. 

Xephos was still. And then he opened his eyes and looked up at Honeydew.

His eyes were glowing gold. 

Slowly, he stood up, and Honeydew stumbled back, clutching his sword and knowing fully well that he wouldn't use it against his best friend. 

Xephos tilted his head to the side, his face now emotionless, his hands completely steady.

He had triggered God Mode. 

His hands began to glow gold, and before Honeydew could react, Xephos flicked his wrist and sent Honeydew flying. He landed hard, cracking his head against the ground. Luckily, his helmet saved him from a concussion.

He quickly clambered to his feet, dizzy from the impact, but Xephos had lost interest in him. He watched with horror as Xephos' feet left the ground, and he slowly rose up into the air like a puppet on strings. 

In a calm, almost trance-like manner, he raised his hand and shot a blast of magic into the clouds. The magic spread like golden lightning, and a second after it disappeared, the clouds turned black and green, and the wind picked up, so strong that it actually knocked Honeydew over. Lightning ripped through the sky and the thunder was so loud it shook the ground. Clouds began to swirl around Xephos, causing a cyclone that prevented Honeydew from getting anywhere near him. In fact, the cyclone was so strong that Honeydew was forced to run.

He quickly took cover in a small cave, watching in fear as Xephos, at the center of the cyclone, began to launch blasts of magic, which morphed into fireballs and struck the ground with devastating force. The cyclone itself began to tear up the ground and throw blocks everywhere. 

Suddenly, something landed hard outside the cave. At first Honeydew thought it was another block or an unfortunate animal, but then the thing stood up, and he saw that it was Ridge.

Quickly clambering up, he grabbed Ridge by the back of his coat and pulled him into the cave.

Ridge yelped, but when he saw that it was Honeydew, he breathed a sigh of relief. 

“You're still alive,” he said, more of a reassurance to himself than a question.

“Won't be much longer if he keeps fucking shit up like that,” said Honeydew, gesturing out the cave where the sounds of explosions and wind and the tornado ripping up the ground blocked out all other noises. 

Ridge shook his head. “This is my fault...” he muttered, looking out at the storm. He quickly turned back to Honeydew. “Look, I want you to ignore the little voice in your head that tells you to do stupid stuff and just _stay put_. Got it? Nobody else is going to get hurt because of me...”

As much as Honeydew knew he was right, he still wanted to help. But this time, logic won out. Logic, and the fear of what Xephos was capable of.

“Okay,” said Honeydew quietly. “Just... please don't hurt him...”

Ridge sighed a bit. “I don't plan to.” 

Then he turned and crawled out of the cave, struggling to stay upright in the strong wind. Debris flew past him, coming dangerously close to him. A stray tree branch nearly impaled his shoulder, but he managed to duck out of the way in time. 

He had to get close enough to Xephos to extract the poison. It was the only way to stop him before the destruction spread. 

Either that or kill him.

“No one will die this time...” he muttered to himself as he fought his way closer. He couldn't let anyone else die. It was his job to protect this world, and so far he hadn't done his job. 

_No one was going to die... No one was going to die..._

It was becoming too dangerous on the ground. Debris was flying everywhere, fireballs were flying dangerously close to him, and lightning was exploding on the ground around him. 

He quickly took to the air, his eyes flashing gold as he triggered God Mode. Using his magic, he created a shield in front of him to hopefully prevent the debris from hitting him. However, the shield was shattered a second later when a lightning bolt shot from the glowing center of the cyclone and hit it dead on. 

Ridge was knocked backwards through the air, his ears ringing from the deafening crack. Xephos had definitely noticed him now.

An enormous fireball shot through the swirling clouds, and for a moment, Ridge was paralyzed as his fear of fire was literally hurdled at his face. At the last second, however, he snapped out of it and crossed his arms in front of his face, creating a shield at the last second.

The fireball enveloped him and swirled around him for a moment before dissipating and leaving Ridge unharmed. 

Taking a deep breath, Ridge braced himself and flew straight towards the vortex. Glowing bolts of magic shot past him, and he skillfully dodged them all. 

The hardest for him to dodge was the lightning. It had a life of it's own, coming after him and attempting to knock him out of the sky. It shattered every bit of magical protection he surrounded himself with. 

And then he made it to the wall of the cyclone. 

The attacks stopped, and the golden glow within the swirling clouds intensified. Ridge cautiously pushed his way through the clouds, fighting to stay airborne. 

When he saw Xephos, his hearts nearly stopped. 

Xephos had become deathly pale, and there was blood dripping out of his nose, eyes, and mouth. His eyes were still glowing gold, and his face was contorted with pain. 

He had never triggered God Mode before. Ridge realized he was using too much power. He was killing himself. 

Suddenly, Xephos lunged forward and grabbed Ridge around the throat. Before Ridge could pry himself away, Xephos sent bolts of electricity through his arms and into Ridge's throat and chest. 

Ridge seized up and convulsed, the electricity quickly draining his magic. He was slipping out of God Mode, and as soon as he did, Xephos would kill him.

He felt one of his hearts stop beating already. 

Using every ounce of willpower, he placed his hands on Xephos' chest. A second later, he drew out the poison.

The electricity stopped. The lightning around them faded away, as did the wind. Ridge felt himself start to go limp, but right after he closed his eyes, he felt someone grab him under the arms and hold him close as if in an embrace.

A few seconds later, thanks to his accelerated healing, the heart that had stopped restarted, and he opened his eyes. They had reached the ground, and Xephos, whose hands were no longer glowing and whose eyes had mostly returned to normal, gently lowered him down.

Almost instantly, Honeydew came running over and helped Ridge sit up, while Xephos dropped to his knees, breathing hard. He looked even paler than before, and the whites of his eyes were red from burst veins. 

Ignoring the pain he was feeling, Ridge sat up and looked at Xephos, who realized something was wrong a second before it all went downhill.

Xephos suddenly gasped and clutched his chest. His eyes completely stopped glowing gold, and he fell to the side, curling up in the fetal position. 

He had used too much of his own life energy in God Mode, and now that he had slipped out of it, he was dying. 

Ridge quickly moved over to Xephos, even though he couldn't do anything to help him. He too had used more energy than he should have, and it would only be minutes before the physical symptoms began to appear.

“What's going on?!” exclaimed Honeydew in a panic. “What's happening to him?”

Ridge didn't answer. Instead he sat and watched, feeling beyond useless that he couldn't do anything to help Xephos, who was shaking and struggling to breathe. Ridge reached out and put his hand on his chest, keeping track of his racing heartbeat.

Xephos clutched his throat and opened his mouth like he was trying to speak. “H-... Hon-...” He couldn't speak. But he still shakily reached towards Honeydew, who grasped his hand and kept talking to him, telling him it was all going to be okay.

It took nearly five minutes for it to end. Xephos was in excruciating pain, and he had become so pale he looked albino. 

Finally, he stopped shaking. It also looked like he stopped breathing, but Ridge assured Honeydew that Xephos was still alive. He had slipped into a coma. 

With a sigh, Ridge sat back and looked at his hands. The symptoms of overuse were starting to appear – his hands began to turn an ashy black, and he was certain his eyes had begun to glow red by now. 

“Honeydew...” he said after a minute. “Lomadia and Nilesy have a base nearby. Do you think you can get Xephos there by yourself?”

He nodded. “Yeah, but... where are you going?”

Ridge dizzily stood up, clutching his chest and pulling his hand away to see it covered in blood. “I'm going after Lalnable,” he said, strapping on his jet pack. “Get Xephos somewhere safe; he's still in danger of burning out, and you need to get him stable. Lomadia's smart, she'll know what to do.”

Honeydew nodded, and Ridge turned and left, flying much easier now that the wind had died down and the storm seemed to be dissipating. 

He wasn't in the air for two minutes before he suddenly screeched to a stop, blinded by a sharp pain in his head. He closed his eyes and saw in his mind's eye what was happening.

He could have sworn that all three of his hearts stopped working for a second when he realized what had happened.

He realized he was too late.


	6. The Heart of Chaos

Lalnable was at the castle. They were almost sure of it. If anything Ridge had said was true, then he would have been drawn to the castle like a moth to flames. 

The only problem was that the castle was too far away for them to walk and still make it on time. Even though the storm above them was intensifying, they were forced to fly. 

Almost as soon as they were in the air, the skies darkened and the wind picked up. It was so strong that it almost ripped the hang glider out of Lalna's hands, and it nearly sent Nano careening out of control. She did a few flips before managing to regain control. 

“You okay?” shouted Lalna over the wind.

Nano nodded quickly, looking a bit green. 

Two minutes after that, Lalna was nearly struck by lightning. After that, they flew much lower, and after a few more minutes of the most turbulent flight of their lives, they finally landed on the outskirts of the castle. Lalna dropped to his knees, dizzy from the flight. Nano stumbled off to the side and vomited. 

“Are you okay?” asked Lalna after his vision stopped spinning. 

“Yeah, I'm good,” choked out Nano, wiping her mouth and standing up. “I think that's the first time I've ever gotten airsick though...” 

She took Lalna's arm and pulled him to his feet. He was about to thank her, but he suddenly grimaced, clutching his head. A few seconds later, however, the headache disappeared. 

“That was weird...” he muttered.

Nano didn't speak for a second. That was how Lalna knew something was wrong.

“What is it?” he asked.

Nano gulped. “Well uh... You kinda...” She shook her head a bit and pulled a small hand mirror out of her inventory.

He took the mirror, but he nearly dropped it when he saw his reflection.

The flux had suddenly spread up the left side of his neck and across his eyes, turning them dark purple. 

“How the hell did that happen so fast...?” he muttered, looking up at Nano with concern. 

She shook her head and took Lalna's face in her hands, standing on her toes to get a better look. She quickly compared the purple on his face to the purple on her hands and realized that this new progression wasn't as dark. It was spreading fast, but it didn't seem to be getting severe yet.

“Okay, we'll keep an eye on it,” she said, taking back the mirror. “Just let me know if you start hearing voices.”

Lalna nodded and glanced up at the sky. The turbulent clouds had turned black and green, and there were nonstop bolts of lightning firing through them. Maybe it was just his fluxed eyes playing tricks on him, but for a second he thought the lightning looked gold.

“We should get going,” he said, turning towards the castle, which looked a hundred times more menacing with the storm raging on in the sky above. “Whatever Lalnable is hiding behind the walls, we've got to stop it...”

Nano nodded, and they began to cautiously move towards the castle. Because Nano was slightly behind Lalna, she noticed that the flux on his back was starting to seep through his lab coat. It was a bad sign, but she didn't tell him. They would deal with this after they had stopped Lalnable. 

They reached the edge of the taint and carefully moved closer to the corrupted castle. Several infected creatures were milling around, but they didn't seem to show any interest in them. 

They cautiously made their way over to the hole in the wall of the largest tower. However, when they stepped inside, they stopped, staring at the destruction. The entire inside of the tower had been mostly eaten away by the taint, causing what used to be Lalna's lab to be flooded. 

All that time he had spent building this castle and everything in it... Everything he had left in his lab... it was all destroyed. He wasn't sure if it was from the destruction or from all the dark energy in the air, but he felt dizzy and swayed a bit before grabbing the wall to keep from falling. 

“Wow...” muttered Nano, looking around with a distant look in her eyes. 

While she was staring up at the flux climbing the walls and coating the ceiling, Lalna looked down at the sticky purple water beneath them.

“Wait a second...” he muttered, squinting to see past the dark sludge. “There's something down there...”

This brought Nano's attention back. “What is it?” she asked, looking down.

“One way to find out,” said Lalna, glancing at her. She nodded, and they both activated their jet packs and hovered over the purple liquid. 

“Ready?” asked Lalna, holding out his hand.

Nano nodded and took hold of his hand. “Hold your breath,” she said.

Lalna smiled, and they both cut off their jet packs. They fell for a moment before landing hard in the water. 

Almost instantly, Lalna was overwhelmed by the rush of voices in his head. His thoughts felt sluggish and he felt his body go limp, as if he were paralyzed. 

Then he felt Nano pulling his hand, dragging him through the water. They passed through something, and all of a sudden they were dry. Nano dragged Lalna a bit further away from the translucent surface they had passed through, and she dropped him on the floor, leaving him sprawled out to catch his breath.

“What the hell happened?” asked Nano, looking down at him. She looked like she was glowing brighter than normal, especially her eye. 

Lalna just stared at her for a minute, dazed, until he finally regained the ability to speak.

“Was that Mother...?” he asked quietly, still hearing the voices echoing in his head. 

Nano smiled sympathetically. “You'll learn to love her. Now get up, we've got a madman to stop.”

Lalna shook his head and pulled himself to his feet, looking around the small clean room. It looked to be clear of taint, as far as they knew. They looked around for a moment before Nano spotted something embedded in the floor.

“Hey Lalna, what's this?” she asked, looking down at the strange block.

“That's a travel anchor,” said Lalna, looking closely. “Here, watch this.”

He stepped onto the block, and a holographic display appeared, revealing two other travel anchors. Nano stood next to him, one hand holding his arm. 

“Let's see where this goes,” Lalna muttered, tapping the first display.

Nothing happened.

He hit the button a few more times. Nano tried hitting it too, with much more violence than Lalna. 

“Shit,” he muttered. “I forgot, we need a Staff of Traveling.”

“Do we have one of those?”

“I don't have it with me, no.”

Nano sighed and rubbed her temple, trying to nurse away the dizzying headache she had suddenly gotten. “Well is there any other way?” she asked, sounding grumpy because she was starting to feel nauseous again. She wasn't sure if it was from the headache, the flux, or the stress. Probably all three. 

Lalna sighed a bit. He wrapped his arm around Nano's shoulder.

“Close your eyes...” he muttered, sounding defeated. She did, and a second later she was hit with two blasts of cold air as they teleported twice down the line of travel anchors. When they stopped a second later, she opened her eyes and saw that they were in a completely different room about ten or fifteen meters down. 

“How did you... oh...” She started to ask how they had teleported without the staff, but then she actually looked up at Lalna. She saw that he had gone pale, and his eyes were glowing a much brighter shade of purple than before. A few strands of his hair had turned black. 

She watched for a second as he closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths, and the color slowly started to return to his face. The few strands of hair turned blond again, and when he opened his eyes, they were back to the dark purple the flux had changed them to. 

He had come very close to waking up the Enderbeast. 

“I'm fine...” he muttered quietly, looking around the room, searching for any sign of the cannibal clone. 

“Okay, yeah... One quick question,” said Nano. “What's that?”

Lalna actually looked up for the first time and saw an enormous reactor in the center of the room. 

“ _That_ is a very large and very dangerous reactor,” whispered Lalna, now feeling much more nervous than he had at first. Maybe they should have waited for Ridge...

With a gulp, he slowly crept into the room, followed closely by Nano. They looked around, but it all seemed quiet...

Suddenly, a voice crackled loudly, seeming to come out of the walls.

_“Well....”_ hissed the voice menacingly. _“You two either got very lucky with the cure, or you cheated... Seeing as both of you are still alive, I'm guessing you cheated... Lalna, you missed a chance to meet one of your other clones...”_

Lalna glanced at Nano, who only shrugged. They continued to move forward, heading towards an unmarked door that Nano only noticed because she saw a bit of purple light coming through the gaps. 

_“I'm so glad you could make it,”_ continued Lalnable, his voice sounding less and less human as he carried on. _“You are really going to love the little treat I've got in store for you and your friends...”_

They had reached the door. Lalna slowly took hold of the handle.

“You're crazy, Lalnable,” he said, doing his best to keep his voice from cracking with fear. “You aren't a threat... You're just a fucked up clone...”

The voice over the intercom was silent for a few seconds. Then it spoke, the voice now sounding like a growl.

_“Not even that... anymore...”_

Lalna opened the door, and he and Nano stepped inside, weapons out and ready to fight. 

The room was large, and the walls were lined with sheets of metal, seemingly to keep the flux out. It didn't seem to be working, however, because they could both clearly see the purple goo dripping through the gaps. In the center of the room, on a raised platform, was a large object about ten feet tall. It mostly looked like thrown together pieces of metal, but as soon as Lalna saw the keyboard and all the wires running out of it and along the floor, he realized what it was.

It was a giant bomb. 

The second he realized this, however, he and Nano were grabbed from behind. Whatever grabbed them was strong enough to hold their arms behind their backs, and to carry them to the center of the room, right next to the bomb. 

Nano managed to glance back at their captors, and she saw that they were villagers, or they had once been. Their faces and throats were severely mangled, and they were covered in claw marks and bites. Their eyes were sewn shut and there were wires and diodes and other cybernetics embedded in their skulls and flesh so they could be controlled through wireless means. Nano quickly turned back around and clenched her teeth, doing her best not to vomit again. 

And then Lalnable stepped around the corner.

Nano and Lalna both gasped and immediately stopped struggling.

Lalnable wasn't wearing his goggles. He wasn't wearing a mask. He wasn't wearing gloves. He had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. There was nothing stopping them from seeing that almost every visible patch of skin was completely covered in flux.

He had only been exposed to the flux for a single day, and it had almost completely consumed him. Ridge was right. All it needed was a good host. And now it had one. 

Lalnable smiled widely, his grin bloodstained. 

“Who helped you get rid of the poison?” he asked, pacing the length of the bomb. “It was Ridge, wasn't it? Y'know, now that I think about it, it was probably a bad idea to show you the doll...”

When Lalnable turned his back to pace the other way, Nano glanced over at Lalna. However, he wasn't looking at her. He was staring long and hard at the bomb, a distant look in his eyes. She realized that he was already working through how to disable it.

“So as you've probably guessed,” continued Lalnable, leaning against the explosive, “this is a bomb. Sure it's a little rudimentary, but that's because it was built from one of the few blueprints you didn't save.” He shot a glare at Lalna. 

“This is also from a time before you were poisoned, Lalna. I chose it because it can destroy the world, and because you won't be able to remember how to disarm it.”

“So this is your plan?” asked Nano, her voice quiet with horror. She glared up at Lalnable, her gaze suddenly switching to rage that was strong enough to disintegrate any mortal man. “You're going to set off a bomb in this place?”

“You've probably guessed what it'll do,” said Lalnable, interested to see if she had figured out his plan.

“It'll disperse all the flux,” she said, glancing around at the purple goop behind the walls. “It'll send it out for miles... The people, the land, the animals... everything will be infected. And they wouldn't know it until it was too late. Until the flux had spread too far to be cured... It'll destroy the world...”

Lalnable nodded. “Very good. I was afraid I was going to have to monologue... But there's one thing you didn't guess. What's in it for me? Why do I want to destroy the world?”

“Because you're a crazy fruitcake?” 

Lalnable shook his head a bit. “Really, I don't have a reason. Why does a dog chase it's tail? Because it's fun. I just want to watch the world burn...”

Nano rolled her eyes a bit. Lalnable saw this, so he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small remote control with a single button.

“If you're tired of me talking, we can get things started now,” he purred, his smile going beyond menacing to the point where it was downright sinister. His eyes were glowing bright, clouded with insanity. Something other than Mother – something much darker and more malevolent – was talking to him.

“What do you say, Nano?” he asked, his voice crackling and sounding distorted. “Shall we begin?”

He pressed the button.

The bomb sprung to life, shaking and whirring as it charged. The computer screen flickered to life and a timer began to count down from five minutes. 

The second the timer started to tick down, Nano sprung into action. She whipped around and, in one smooth motion, decapitated the experiments that were restraining them. Lalna instantly ran over to the bomb, while Nano chased down and tackled Lalnable, who had been pulling out a gun to shoot Lalna with.

They both hit the ground, Nano using Lalnable as a soft landing, and they were up, circling each other. At first Lalnable didn't appear to be armed, seeing as his gun had shattered on the impact, but then he held out his hand, and from the thick dark flux, a sword appeared, seeming to grow out of his hand. The blade was darker than obsidian, and it had black smoke swirling around it.

Nano wasn't afraid though. She stood as tall as she possibly could, holding her sword out. A second later, Lalnable lunged at her, and they went back and forth trying to slice each other to bits.

While this was happening, Lalna was frantically typing away on the screen. The countdown clock was approaching three minutes. 

He had to focus. He knew there was a specific way to disarm the bomb, but he couldn't remember it. Or... could he?

He realized a second later that the poison had weakened the block Ridge had put on his mind. He needed information just on the other side of that wall, but he was afraid that trying to remember would completely shatter the block. He was afraid he would remember everything. 

He looked over at Nano, who was slowly forcing Lalnable back. Mother was helping her fight whatever was aiding Lalnable. 

He had to remember. He had to risk it, or Nano and everybody else that he cared about would die. He would remember, even if it cost him his sanity. 

He started looking back, pushing through the block. A moment later, he was on the other side.

Thousands of memories rushed at him, the half of his life that had been locked away for so long. He had to focus. He had to only remember what he needed to.

Slowly, all of the extra memories faded back behind the block, and he was left with what he needed to know. That the bomb he was standing in front of was a large-scale version of the one Israphel had used to destroy the wall. Something he had designed. Another weapon of mass destruction.

With a very peculiar flaw.

It couldn't be disarmed.

Lalna snapped back into focus, seeing that only three seconds had passed. For a moment, he didn't know what to do. The bomb couldn't be disarmed. There was no way to stop it.

Then he remembered there was a way to modify it.

He got to work.

At the same time, Nano was kicking Lalnable's ass. She had backed him up against the wall, sliced open at least three different places on every limb, and a moment later, she disarmed him. 

She realized that, even though Lalnable was almost completely corrupted by the flux, he still hadn't mastered control of it like she had. Mother was helping her. Whoever Lalnable was listening to seemed to be waiting. 

A moment later, Nano had her sword to Lalnable's throat. She knew that she should kill him, but she realized she couldn't. If she killed him, whatever was trapped inside his mind might escape. 

And she couldn't kill him because he was Lalna's clone.

So for that split second, she hesitated.

Lalnable saw this, and within seconds, her sword was gone as well. Lalnable pulled another gun out from under his torn up and bloody lab coat. However, he aimed it at Lalna.

“Alright,” he said to Nano, “one wrong move and your love gets a laser through his back.”

Nano froze. She looked back and forth between Lalna and the maniac standing in front of her. Then she slowly held up her hands and backed up.

Lalnable chuckled, which sounded more like a cough. “Sentiment... All you did was give him a few more seconds.”

Lalnable turned to face the unsuspecting Lalna. He started to pull the trigger.

Nano didn't let him get any further than that.

Even though she had never done it before, she reached out and took control of the flux under Lalnable's skin. She held him in place for a moment before slowly forcing him to drop the gun, which clattered loudly to the floor.

Lalnable shot a sinister glare at her, but because the flux had taken over so much of his body, he wasn't able to move. He couldn't even speak.

Nano slowly twirled her finger, and Lalnable turned on the spot, facing her. She pinned his arms at his sides and forced his hands to clench into fists. She forced him to clench his jaw, so even if he had a cyanide tablet, he wouldn't be able to get to it. 

She had complete and utter control over him, and they both knew it. 

Then a small, menacing smile crept onto her face. She slowly raised her hand, lifting Lalnable into the air. His eyes showed panic, and behind that, rage. 

Nano's smile widened. Then she slammed Lalnable into the wall until he lost consciousness. She waited until he had stopped moving to let go of the flux. When she did, she stumbled backwards, suddenly exhausted from the amount of energy that had required. Her nose started to bleed, and she felt nauseous again, but she didn't pay attention to that. Instead, she ran back over to Lalna.

There was only a minute and thirty seconds left on the timer. The whirring of the bomb was much louder now – it was almost done charging.

“Lalna!” exclaimed Nano.

He glanced up at her, and he wasn't quick enough to hide the look of fear.

“What's happening?” she asked quickly. “Did you disarm it...?”

Lalna shook his head and stepped away from the bomb. “No... but I did modify it...”

He took her hand and quickly led her off the platform and to the furthest side of the room. 

“What did you do?” asked Nano quickly.

“I hacked into it and decreased the blast radius. It'll only destroy the castle now, and instead of dispersing the flux, it'll pull it in and keep it from getting into the air,” he explained.

Nano shook her head a bit, looking around. “You would destroy your castle...?”

“There's nothing here for me now,” he said, taking her face in his hands. “I was alone for so long when I was here... I had nothing until you fell out of the sky. This castle... it's just a reminder now... And uh... I've never been very fond of bad memories...”

Nano glanced at the bomb. 

45 seconds.

“You know there was never enough time for us to get far enough away...” she said quietly, taking his hands.

“You could try and leave,” he said.

“And lose you to another bomb? Not again...”

Lalna sighed and looked down at their hands. He looked at the flux. It was his fault she had been infected. It was his fault any of this had happened. 

He shook his head a bit. “It all started here...” he said quietly. “You and me and... all the flux... It's only fitting that it ends here...”

Nano nodded and looked at the timer.

5 seconds.

She looked back at Lalna. “I love you...” she whispered.

Lalna smiled. “I know...”

The last thing he saw was her face. Her bloody, half purple, beautiful face. 

There was a blinding flash of white light, but the sound of the explosion didn't even reach them before it all went dark.


	7. Too Late

When Lalna blinked his eyes open, he saw the sky. The gray, stormy sky and turbulent clouds. 

At first he was confused, but then he realized that his castle was gone, and he was lying at the bottom of the crater where it used to be. The bomb had annihilated everything. The castle, and the flux. It was all gone.

His ears were ringing, and he knew he was hurt, but he couldn't quite register the pain yet. Looking down, he saw that splotches of blood were slowly spreading across the right side of his chest. Whatever had injured him – which was most likely the shrapnel from the explosion – must have hit his lung, because he was having trouble breathing. He also glanced over at his right arm and saw that the sleeve of his lab coat had burnt away, and his arm between his elbow and shoulder was covered in blood, the flesh torn to bits to the point where he could see the bones beneath the muscle. 

As if in a trance, he looked around again. It took a minute for his vision to focus, but when it did, he finally saw Nano. She was curled up on her side about twenty feet away from him. She was moving, however, and Lalna didn't see any blood on her. He watched as she got to her knees, shaking and breathing hard. She vomited a minute later.

When her fit of nausea ended, she shakily stood up, looking around. It only took her a second to spot Lalna.

Stepping over the smoldering rubble, she carefully made her way over to him and, seeing that he was awake, she helped him sit up. The movement sent a wave of pain through his abdomen, but he still felt no pain in his arm. The scientific part of his mind calmly told him this was because the nerves in his arm had been destroyed. The only reason he could move his mechanical arm was because the nerve transmitters were connected wirelessly. 

“Lalna...?” gasped Nano, shaken and breathless. “Are you okay...?”

“Mostly...” he choked out, his voice muted and rough. Now that he was sitting upright, the blood was spilling out of his chest much faster, and it was making him dizzy. 

Suddenly, something near the center of the crater started moving. Nano pulled Lalna to his feet, holding onto him to keep him upright. 

Several rocks moved, and something stood up, breathing hard and bleeding heavily.

It was Lalnable. Whatever was using him as a host must have saved him from the blast in the same way Mother had protected them. 

Lalnable stumbled to his feet, looking around frantically. He looked terrified, the way he was clutching his chest and gasping. 

Lalna and Nano realized a second later what was wrong.

They watched in horror as the flux under Lalnable's skin began to spread rapidly, and they could do nothing to stop the flux from consuming him.

Only seconds after Lalnable stopped moving, Lalna realized what was happening.

“The flux...” he groaned, breathing hard. 

“What?” gasped Nano, looking up at him, still shocked at what had happened. 

“I changed the settings on the bomb,” he muttered, struggling to speak audibly. “It pulled in the flux instead of dispersing it. All that flux had to go somewhere, right?”

As he spoke, the flux on his arms and face began to spread. Nano glanced down at her arms and saw that the flux was spreading fast on her too. 

“We absorbed all the flux...” said Lalna, sounding exhausted. 

Nano pointed at Lalnable. “That's going to happen to us too...?”

“It's already started...” he choked out, looking at his hands. The flux had even spread to his mechanical hand, which had purple goo dripping from it. 

Nano glanced at her hands and saw that he was right. 

Lalna saw how scared she looked, so he painstakingly took her left hand in his mechanical right hand. 

She looked up at him, her eyes wide. “What's going to happen to us...?” she asked quietly.

He sighed a bit and shook his head. “I guess... either way, we'll be together.”

She smiled, holding his hand tighter. They both faced forward and closed their eyes as the flux consumed them.

**XXX**

Ridge arrived only minutes later. He landed hard and screeched to a stop when he saw the enormous crater. He ran to the edge and looked down, feeling his stomach drop.

Feeling like he was walking in slow motion, he made his way down into the crater. He looked over at Lalnable, who stood frozen in place. What looked like a black fog swirled beneath his skin. Whatever was in his mind was trapped in there with him.

And then he looked over at Lalna and Nano.

He felt like he couldn't breathe. They were standing next to each other, holding hands. They had both been completely crystallized in flux. It was as if the flux beneath their skin had solidified, turning them to crystals. 

Slowly, he waved his hand over them, using the last vestiges of his magic. After a minute, he breathed a sigh of relief. They both had signs of life beneath the crystals. The flux crystals appeared to have the same effect as stasis. 

Either way, he had to get them out of here. He had to get them safe. 

And then he noticed something. Lalna was holding something, clenched in his left hand. Ridge carefully took it, and he held it up. It was a sapphire necklace. 

He carefully tucked it into his jacket before turning back to two of the four people in the world he had ever considered friends. 

There was only one place he could think of that was safe to take them to. Only one place where he could keep them safe until he could wake them up. Only one place where he could lock up Lalnable and prevent the thing trapped beneath the crystals from escaping.

He quickly moved over to Lalnable and carried him closer to the other two. Then, with one hand on Lalnable's shoulder and the other hand on Nano's arm, he teleported away, leaving nothing behind in the ruins of the once great castle. 

**To Be Continued...**


End file.
